Intuitive Bodywork is a blanket term I first heard from my Reiki instructor to describe practices that used intuition to help heal on a psychological or physical level, such as hands healing or massage. I have since broadened the term to include any practice which focuses on surrendering control to the intuition rather than the rational mind in order to accomplish the desired intent of the practice.
Traditionally, practices that have surrender to the intuition as an intrinsic part of their execution are techniques of hands healing based energy work such as Reiki or the hands healing of Barbara Brennan. These will usually involve intuitive focus on parts of the patient’s body for therapeutic effects. In my expanded definition, this could also include practices such as intuitively directed divination, automatic writing (aka channeling), Osho’s dynamic meditations, or Crowley’s concept of “making each moment a dealing of God with one’s soul.” It is very much my belief that Crowley and many other practices are arguing for techniques that gradually put you in a state of doing intuitive bodywork all the time.
The crucial difference in my practice that is sometimes present, sometimes absent from others is this: the health of one’s inner world of the soul/psyche is what directs the intuition. Consequently, most of my practice focuses on using the techniques of multiple paradigms to heal the inner world so that one can allow their more automatic, intuitive expressions to bleed into the outer world in ways that won’t be harmful to them or others. The focus is not some means of transcending one’s humanity in a spiritual way so much as it is one of healing one’s inner world in order embrace their humanity, feelings, and depth more fully, and then use that increased depth to intuitively express themselves in the physical world. What happens after we die, or whether or not God or Gods exist is irrelevant, and consequently should not interfere with any religious or spiritual beliefs one already has. It is a process of embracing and enjoying being alive while we are here on earth.
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